Page:Select historical documents of the Middle Ages.djvu/290

270 The Donation document is first quoted in the middle of the ninth century; the legend upon which it is founded is older. That Constantine really did give a great deal to the church is undoubted. There are three lists of his gifts in the "Liber Pontificalis," the earliest history of the popes. The Constantine Donation was at times doubted even in the Middle Ages. Otto III. called it a lie, as did also Arnold of Brescia. On the other hand, Urban II. claimed Corsica by virtue of it; Anselm, Gratiau, and Ivo of Chartres, all received it into their collections of canon law; and, according to John of Salisbury, Adrian TV. relied on it in claiming the right to dispose of Ireland in 1155. (See above, Book I., No. II.)

In the fifteenth century the Donation began to be seriously attacked by such men as Pecock and Cusa, but it was reserved for Laurentius Valla to really prove its falseness. It has no defenders to-day even among the adherents of the papacy.

There have been many conjectures as to the date of its fabrication. Brunner tries to place it between the years 813 and 816. His argument is ingenious to say the least. It is well known that the emperor Charlemagne, in 813, himself crowned his son, Louis the Pious. The popes did not like this proceeding, and in 816 Stephen IV. comes travelling over the Alps bearing with him a crown. Brunner thinks that if Stephen increased his luggage by a bulky crown it must have been a very special one, probably the one which Sylvester had refused when it was offered by Constantine. To prove the genuineness of this crown the Constantine Donation may have been forged.

No. IV. is the foundation charter of the famous Burgundian monastery of Cluny, which became the parent of so many subordinate institutions. Cluny was founded in 910 by William the Pious, duke of Aquitaine. Berno, abbot of the Benedictine monastery of Beaume, was its